215. They will ask thee as to what they should spend on others. Say: “Whatever of your wealth you spend, shall (first) be for your parents, and for the near of kin, and the orphans, and the needy, and the wayfarer; and whatever good you do, verily, God has full knowledge thereof.”

271. If you do deeds of charity openly, it is well; but if you bestow it upon the needy in secret, it will be even better for you, and it will atone for some of your bad deeds. And God is aware of all that you do.

It is reported of the sixth Imam Jafar as-Sadiq (a) that the Holy Prophet (S) had said that

“Charity in secret, quiets the wrath of God and takes away one’s sin as the water puts out the fire and keeps away seventy kinds of calamities.”

38. Behold, (O believers), it is you who are called upon to spend freely in God’s cause: but (even) among you are such as turn out to be niggardly! And yet, he who acts niggardly (in God’s cause) is but niggardly towards his own self for God is indeed self-sufficient, whereas you stand in need (of Him): and if you turn away (from Him), He will cause other people to take your place, and they will not be the likes of you!

The above implication is that since ‘man has been created weak’ the imposition of too great a burden on the believers would be self-defeating inasmuch as it might result not in an increase of faith but, rather, in its diminution. This passage illustrates the supreme realism of the Qur’an, which takes into account human nature as it is, with all its God willed complexity and its inner contradictions, and does not therefore postulate a priori am impossible ideal as a norm of human behaviour. The last verse is a prophesy about the Non-Arabs who would embrace Islam and who would be more loyal to the cause of the faith than those addressed here.